Trump Picks A Fight With The Navy, While Putin Can't Believe The Dividends This Whole Caper Has Paid Off

The New York Times, NBC News, Reuters and CNN all reported that Trump's Secretary of the Navy, Richard Spencer, and Collin Green, the admiral who heads the Navy SEALs had threatened to resign over Cadet Donald J. Bonespur's interference in the Edward Gallagher case. On Thursday Trump overrode Navy brass' decision to initiate a review that could result in Gallagher being stripped of his status as a SEAL. Trump's tweet challenged the decision.

Defense officials have previously told CNN that the Pentagon does not necessarily view tweets as orders and it is unclear if an official order has been received at this time.

Trump had already intervened in the case last week, reversing Gallagher's demotion for posing for a photo with the dead body of an ISIS casualty in Iraq. US defense officials told CNN that Trump took that action against the advice of senior Pentagon leaders, saying the move along with the President's decision to pardon two Army officers who had been convicted or charged with murder could undermine the military justice system.

About an hour prior to Trump's tweet, Gallagher's attorney, Timothy Parlatore, appeared on Fox News where he slammed the Navy's leadership, particularly Rear Adm. Collin Green, the commander of Naval Special Warfare Command who had ordered the review board.

"This is an action they could have taken any time from July right after the verdict until today, instead the Admiral decided President Trump takes action on a Friday afternoon, Monday morning the Admiral comes in, brings everybody together and says I disagree with the President, we're going to take his Trident," Parlatore told the host of Fox and Friends.

After news of the Navy's review of Gallagher's SEAL status broke Tuesday, Parlatore told CNN that Trump's decision to restore Gallagher's rank meant that any additional punishments would go against the President's intent.

"It's incredible that they still can't let this go," Parlatore said, adding that the Navy's leadership was choosing to "essentially ignore" Trump's decision.

"Whatever you think about this President, that's an extremely dangerous precedent to set," he said, latter calling on Trump to dismiss Green due to "insubordination."

Asked about Trump's tweet, Parlatore told CNN "obviously we're very grateful for it."

Parlatore told CNN that Trump's decision to restore Gallagher's rank meant that any additional punishments-- such as the review board-- were going against the President's intent.

He called Green's actions "out of bounds," saying that his ordering of the review "crossed a very dangerous line, having our uniformed flag officers being directly defiant of our Commander in Chief."

Parlatore said that he hopes that Green is held accountable for his actions and had previously called on Trump to dismiss Green due to "insubordination."

On Tuesday, the Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday made clear he supported Green. His spokesman, Cmdr. Nate Christensen, told CNN that Gilday "supports his commanders in executing their roles, to include Rear Adm. Green."

Gallagher had faced a court-martial for premeditated murder and attempted murder but was acquitted. "Given his service to our Nation, a promotion back to the rank and pay grade of Chief Petty Officer is justified," the White House said in a statement Friday.

CNN followed up Saturday to add that "Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley have raised serious concerns with the White House in the last 48 hours after President Donald Trump signaled he would block the Navy from ejecting Eddie Gallagher from the SEALs... As of Saturday afternoon, a review of Gallagher's status was expected to proceed. That review is considering whether he should be able to continue as a SEAL or be expelled, according to one defense official."

NBC's Courtney Kube and Carol E. Lee reported that "Military leaders hoping to keep the Secretary of the Navy from quitting lobbied President Donald Trump aboard Air Force One to stop intervening" in the Gallagher case." Although Spencer claims he never threatened to resign, "Four officials familiar with Spencer’s thinking say he is strongly considering resigning and will do so if Trump signs a written order to end the Navy probe. He conveyed those feelings to Pentagon leaders on Thursday. 'He is deeply, deeply upset by this and believes it undercuts his authority,' one former Navy official said, adding that it also undercuts Rear Adm. Collin Green, commander of the Navy’s Special Warfare Command, who ordered the review and is trying to maintain good order and discipline in the SEAL community. Several of the president’s senior advisers and military leaders weighed in after Thursday’s tweet, explaining the consequences of ordering a halt to the review board, say officials."

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley, Deputy Secretary of Defense David Norquist, Army Chief of Staff General McConville, Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy, and Sgt. Major of the Army Michael Grinston spoke with the president about the process on Air Force One Thursday night, according to three U.S. officials familiar with the conversation.

The military leaders were with the president en route to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware for the return of two U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan earlier this week.

They explained that the Trident Review Board is a peer review process and it’s best to let the process play out, the three officials said. The president did not know details of the process, the officials said, including how fellow sailors, usually Navy master chiefs, are the ones who make the recommendation.

The president also asked about the cases of former 1st Lt. Clint Lorance and Maj. Matthew Golsteyn. Earlier this month Trump dismissed murder charges against Golsteyn and pardoned Lorance, who was serving 19 years in federal prison for murder.

Trump inquired about restoring Golsteyn’s status as an Army Ranger and special forces soldier. The leaders explained how Trump wading in could impact morale among troops, said the three officials. They stressed that the conversation was not contentious. The military leaders explained the process to Trump, who listened and asked pointed questions, including asking flatly asking the group what he should do.

According to the officials, the leaders told him it was his decision as commander in chief, but they wanted him to understand the consequences.

At the White House Friday, other Trump administration officials echoed Gen. Milley’s advice about Gallagher’s review board, said officials. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper both explained that the president ordering a halt could have wider consequences.

Unless there is a written order, the Navy plans to move forward with the review process, the officials said. They do not expect Trump to issue that written order at this point, but concede he could change his mind.

As of this morning it looked like Trump backed down, rather than have a messy showdown with the military. This morning, the New York Times' Maggie Haberman reiterated that "The secretary of the Navy and the admiral who leads the SEALs have threatened to resign or be fired if plans to expel a commando from the elite unit in a war crimes case are halted by President Trump, administration officials said Saturday. 'The high-level pushback to Mr. Trump’s unambiguous assertion on Twitter this past week that the commando, Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, should remain in the unit was an extraordinary development in what was already an extraordinary case, one with few precedents in the history of presidential relations with the American military. The Navy secretary, Richard V. Spencer, later denied that he had threatened to resign but said disciplinary plans against Chief Gallagher would proceed because he did not consider Mr. Trump’s statement on Twitter to be a formal order. Mr. Spencer added that the president, as commander in chief, had the authority to intervene and that it would stop 'the process.'" And then... late this afternoon, Trump struck and demanded the resignation-- through Defense Secretary Mark Esper-- of his own Navy Secretary. Trump immediately replaced him with the U.S. ambassador to Norway, Kenneth Braithwaite.

Trump's Pardoning Of Men Found Guilty Of War Crimes Is Extremely Dangerous

Ruben Gallego stood with Ted Lieu on the day Lieu was promoted to a colonel 

Ted Lieu (D-CA) served in the air force and today serves as a colonel in the Air National Guard. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) was deployed in Iraq as a Marine corporal. Today the two of them are prominent voices for peace within the Congressional Progressive Caucus. On Friday the L.A. Times published an OpEd the two of them had penned, Trump’s Leniency On War Crimes Weakens National Security. "George Washington said, 'Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable, procures success to the weak, and esteem to all.' The United States has the best military in the world," wrote the two vets, "in part because our soldiers abide by, and believe in, good order and discipline. President Trump’s pardon of a war criminal and potential pardoning of other troops accused of war crimes strikes at the soul of our armed forces, undermines unit cohesion and weakens national security."

Trump never served. We did. One of us fought in the Iraq war. The other prosecuted members of the military who violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice. From the first day of basic training, like every member of the military, we were taught to follow orders, regulations and laws. Unit cohesion suffers and lives are put at risk when troops go rogue and are not punished.

Discipline is so important to the military that Article 134 of the Uniform Code specifically makes it a crime for members to engage in conduct that is prejudicial to “good order and discipline” or that “bring[s] discredit to the armed forces.” Enforcing discipline in an organization as large as the U.S. military requires the certainty of punishment for those who violate regulations or the law. If only certain provisions of the code are enforced, or if members think they can get away with crimes because of a presidential pardon, it will have a corrosive effect on every aspect of readiness, and it will encourage others to disobey orders.

If our adversaries know the American military will flout the law of war, they will be more inclined to do the same.

All members of the military are taught to obey the Law of Armed Conflict, also known as the law of war. Its many provisions enshrine principles we all recognize as basic to appropriate military conduct, including this one: Unarmed civilians are not legitimate military targets. Articles 118 and 134 prohibit murder. It is criminal to intentionally kill a defenseless civilian or to kill prisoners of war.

Some of the war crimes committed by U.S. personnel are indistinguishable from murder.

Army 1st Lt. Michael Behenna was convicted of unpremeditated murder in a combat zone by a military court. He drove an unarmed Iraqi prisoner into the desert, stripped him naked and shot him in the head and chest. Trump recently pardoned him.

Navy SEAL Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher has been charged with committing multiple war crimes in Iraq, including shooting an unarmed civilian girl and an unarmed civilian senior citizen, stabbing to death a defenseless teenage Islamic State captive, and indiscriminately spraying a neighborhood with rockets and machine gun fire. Seven members of SEAL Team 7 came forward and reported Gallagher’s actions to Navy authorities just as the law, their training and their honor demanded. Gallagher has pleaded not guilty. Army Maj. Mathew Golsteyn will be court-martialed for the killing of an unarmed Afghan. Golsteyn admits to the act; the Army calls it murder, he calls it a legitimate ambush. According to news reports, Trump is considering Memorial Day pardons for Golsteyn and Gallagher.

Our military follows the law of war not just because it is the moral thing to do but because it is critical to mission success.

When troops kill civilian children, senior citizens and prisoners of war without justification, those crimes make peace more difficult to secure and hand our enemies a great recruiting tool. If our adversaries know the American military will flout the law of war, they will be more inclined to do the same, including killing future American prisoners of war. If American troops don’t obey the law, Iraqi and Afghan officials will be less likely to cooperate with U.S. military efforts, and civilian anger will put our deployed personnel at increased risk.

We acknowledge the president’s pardon power is nearly unfettered (although it can’t be used to obstruct justice). Trump can pardon war criminals, and there is not much Congress can do to stop him. But we can speak up against this travesty.

Trump may think that formally forgiving those who have been convicted of or charged with committing war crimes is being pro-military. Exactly the opposite is true. Rather than bring “esteem to all,” Trump’s pardons would undermine good order and discipline, increase the risk to our deployed personnel, and stain the soul of our military.

Air Force One by Nancy Ohanian

Pete Buttigieg seems as disturbed by this as Lieu and Gallego. Last week, he told a veterans rally in New Hampshire that "The reason that we can stand up tall and say that's not true, that having served honorably in the military, couldn't be more different than being a war criminal is because if we ever did anything that was wrong the United States under the Uniform Code of Military Justice would have held us accountable... And so when the President joins in with this idea, that it's just natural, that if you serve in conflict, that you're going to wind up murdering somebody, he is eroding the integrity of the military, and insulting the Constitution." You know who I'd like to ask about this? Some of the Republicans in Congress who, like Lieu and Gallego, served in the U.S. military. What does Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) think? How about Lindsay Graham (R-SC)? How about Joni Ernst (R-IA), who, this morning, called him on his loony statement about how North Korean missile tests are OK? And Silent Don Bacon (R-NE)? Tom Cotton (R-AR)? Greg Steube (R-FL)? Lee Zeldin (R-NY)? Steve Stivers (R-OH)? Martha McSally (R-AZ)? These are all men and women who know better but who have devoted their recent careers to enabling Trump. So far, none of them have made a peep, although veterans groups are furious over the pardons. I wonder if the Republican legislators will ever speak up on this. One has-- a criminal himself, Duncan Hunter (R-CA), not only excused the war criminal Trump says he'll pardon, but admitted he's guilty of one of same infractions, though not murder! Basically, Hunter's message was "Oh get over it; everybody does it."

Think this isn't all that important? Prominent figures on the Christian right [including] elected politicians have warned that the fight over abortion rights could lead to a new civil war... Republican lawmakers such as Ohio’s Candice Keller have openly speculated that the divide over abortion rights might lead to civil war... Earlier this month, The Guardian revealed that the Washington state Republican legislator Matt Shea had also speculated about civil war, and the 'Balkanization' of America, predicting that Christians would retreat to 'zones of freedom' such as the inland Pacific north-west, where Shea is campaigning for a new state to break away from Washington.

Asked on a podcast if the two halves of the country could remain together, Shea said: “I don’t think we can, again, because you have half that want to follow the Lord and righteousness and half that don’t, and I don’t know how that can stand.”

Shea has introduced a bill-- unlikely to pass-- which would criminalize abortion in the state.

Right-wing crackpot Trumpist, Milo Yiannopoulos was fomenting civil war this weekend too. And offering himself as the 21st Century version of Robert E. Lee, no less!

I abhor political violence. Let me be clear about that. But when someone takes away your freedom, your speech and your ability to protect yourself and your family, there aren’t many options left. At least, that’s how citizens quickly come to feel.

It getting close to the time when, per America’s founding documents, citizens will start forming into well-regulated militias in preparation for the lawful defense of the Constitution. And maybe I’m the right person to sketch out how that should work.

You know, maximum cell size. Encrypted comms. Like I said, I abhor violence. But civil war is coming, and, if it does, well-meaning but poorly-informed and relentlessly deplatformed conservatives are going to need a handbook.

Deplatformed conservatives? Poor widdle Yiannopoulos is pouting that he's been kicked off every social media platform with an audience of more than a thousand.

Seriously now, is there any reason why Senator McCranky should be taken seriously about military matters -- or anything else?

Is Young Johnny McCranky explaining to NY Senators Gillibrand and Schumer about his superior background and experience?

"The strongest argument for Senator Gillibrand's approach [to curbing sexual abuse in the military] is that the military's been saying the right things for about thirty years on this, and the problem hasn't been fixed."

-- Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), quoted by
The New Yorker's Evan Osnos

by Ken

One of the many reasons I'm grateful for Paul Krugman's years of intrepid op-ed service is his ongoing crusade against the concept of "seriousness" as applied to allegedly serious people in government and its support systems, the technocracy and the media. It is, of course, mutually reinforcing: The pundits anoint "serious" pols and bureaucratic stooges, who in turn bless the seriousness of their media brethren. And if you attempt to find out why any one of these people should actually be taken seriously, it always turns out to be because other "serious" people say so.

Which brings me to the impossible case of Arizona Sen. Young John McCranky, who somehow developed a reputation for "integrity" based on pretty much nothing and to go with it a legend of expertise in subjects for no more apparent reason than his long-standing membership in the Insiders' Boys' Club. I'm the toughness and endurance he demonstrated during his Vietnam POW captivity, there's nothing of distinction in his personal record, allowing for the likely boosts it got from his family naval history. And in his post-military years, has he done anything to qualify himself as an expert beyond playing buddy-buddy with the reigning powers-that-be? And in the military, perhaps even more than in many other institutions, though it applies to most of them too, the powers-that-be are notably mostly for an unshakable conviction that their way of doing things is one true right and proper way to do things.

I go into this with reference to the Crankyman's guest appearance in Evan Osnos's recent New Yorker profile of New York's junior senator, Kirsten Gillibrand ("Strong Vanilla," Dec. 16; only an abstract available free online). Probably everyone recalls that one cause the senator has made personal is doing something about the frightening growth in incidences of sexual assault in the military, and the military's singularly low interest in doing anything about it -- like, you know, investigating and prosecuting reported incidences, which presumably has led to an equally striking growth in unreported incidences, given the significantly greater likelihood that the victim will pay a substantially higher price than the perpetrator. The indications are that the worse the problem grows, the less inclination the military shows to do anything about it.

It's hardly a new thought that there's a built-in conflict of interest in the military's reliance on chain of command, when decisions about investigations and prosecutions are made by people who have an institutional, or often even personal, reason to look the other way. Which led Senator Gillibrand to craft her proposal that this authority be switched from the relevant military commander to professional military prosecutors.

Here's Evan Osnos quoting Young Johnny touting his own expertise:

Gillibrand has proposed a radical solution. Commanders have always had the power to decide which sexual-assault cases to try; she would give that power to military prosecutors instead. The Pentagon has warned that the move would undermine commanders' authority, and many senators agree. One of them is John McCain, of Arizona, a Navy veteran. He told reporters, "I respect Senator Gillibrand's view and her advocacy, but I do not believe that she has the background or experience on this issue. I do."

One senator whose support Gillibrand has secured is Kentucky's libertarian Rand Paul. Now I don't have much truck with those on the left who imagine that we have much common ground with the libertarian right, but there are unquestionably issues where libertarians "get it right" while a lot of folks in the famous "center" and "left of center" don't. The way I look at it is, if even the libertarians in their crackpot ideology can get it right, how difficult can it be to understand?

More from Evan Osnos:

When Gillibrand asked Rand Paul for his vote, he asked her to change some language to clarify which crimes are covered. Then he signed on. Paul told me that his coöperation with Gillibrand is "an argument for having new fresh faces around," and he added, "The strongest argument for Senator Gillibrand's approach is that the military's been saying the right things for about thirty years on this, and the problem hasn't been fixed."

Not only hasn't the problem been fixed, it has grown significantly worse -- and on the political side, that's notwithstanding the "background" and "experience" of Young Johnny McCranky. I don't doubt that Young Johnny has done way more background and experience in drinking with his military pals than has Senator Gillibrand, but in the matter of curbing sexual abuse, it might help if, instead of bragging about his background and experience, he told us how he and his drinking buddies propose finally to get a handle on the problem.


THERE COULD BE ANOTHER POSSIBILITY --

Maybe it isn't necessarily that Young Johnny and his pals are fools or incompetents. Maybe they just don't see sexual abuse as a problem.

It's folk wisdom that in war behavior which would be intolerable in any other walk of life is not only tolerated but perhaps encouraged. When we hear accounts of our supposedly elite military squads in Afghanistan, we get a window into a culture of hyper-manly-manness which always leaves me feeling more than a little queasy.

What if Young Johnny and his drinking buddies are firm believers in the notion that "boys will be boys," and what's more, the best fighters are thoseeled by the hightest-octane testosterone. Sure, their behavior may overstep the prissy limits of polite society, but our national security depends on their manly-mannish ability to rise to whatever level of manliness situations may require.

Would it be scurrilous to sugggest that we have a military command, and a corps of political protectors, who believe that sexual assault is just part of the price we pay to keep America, you know, American?

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Reckless disregard for due process got the gov't into the Guantánamo mess, yet they keep thinking more reckless disregard will get them OUT of it

Judge Lamberth in 2009 (spelling doesn't seem to be C-SPAN's
strong suit) -- he didn't sound like a happy camper yesterday.

"It is a sad reality that in the ten years since the first detainees were brought to Guantanamo Bay not a single one has been fully tried or convicted of any crime. Despite this, the Government has fought to deny detainees the ability to challenge their indefinite detentions through habeas proceedings. In a litany of rulings, this Court and the Supreme Court have affirmed that the Federal courts are open to Guantanamo detainees who wish to prove that their indefinite detentions are illegal."

-- D.C. District Court Chief Judge Royce Lamberth, slapping down the latest gov't end run around due process for Guantánamo detainees

by Ken

Ouch! Chief Judge Lamberth sure doesn't sound like a happy camper, does he?

This whole chunk of his ruling is quoted in Michael Doyle's McClatchy report on the judge's slapdown, "Judge sides with Guantanamo detainees." To get us up to speed on the story, here's how Doyle's account begins:

Using strong words, a federal judge has rejected the Obama administration's efforts to change the rules under which Guantanamo Bay detainees are represented by lawyers.

Denouncing what he called "an illegitimate exercise of Executive power," U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth said in his 32-page ruling that an existing 2008 court order will continue to guide detainees' access to counsel, even in cases where there is not an active habeas corpus petition.

"It is clear that the government had no legal authority to unilaterally impose a counsel-access regime, let alone one that would render detainees’ access to counsel illusory," Lamberth declared.

It's just a shame that the U.S. District Court's powers don't extend to punishing the gov't thugs and/or legal cretins who have been burdening the federal courts with their flagrantly abusive perversion of both the military and the civilian legal systems. I'm thinking along the lines of someday -- actually, tomorrow would work fine for me! -- having all the officials of the Bush and Obama administrations who've participated in the perversion of the administration of justice rounded up and dumped in the hold of a cargo ship for transport to their own wing at Gitmo, where they will be treated, not merely under the flagrantly illegal and unconstitutional conditions they have instituted for their prisoners, but better still, under the very worst conditions they've attempted to impose, including all those already struck down by Judge Lamberth's court and the U.S. Supreme Court.

The net effect would be de facto permanent incarceration with essentially no contact with the outside world. Boo-hoo.

It can be argued that some, at least, of those U.S. officials have acted not out of a will to criminally subvert, or to cover up a history of governmental criminal subversion, but simply out of their own sniveling incompetence. Fair enough! I'm not sure that's exactly excuplatory, but there should be adequate opportunity for them to make their case at, er, some point --to, um, somebody, although the only somebodies they'll ever have access to are the ones who put them there, and those somebodies have a powerful interest in making sure their victims are never heard from. And don't forget, under the most extreme theories advanced by the U.S. injustice authorities, it may well constitute an intolerable breach of national security even to tell them why they're there!

Not to worry, though. During their essentially permanent stays at Gitmo, the U.S. injustice officials will be treated . . . well, with all the consideration they wanted to extend to their prisoners, which is to say pretty much none. Fortunately, they won't have to worry about outright torture, unless some unnamed functionary thinks they would benefit from being tortured.

LET'S TAKE A MOMENT HERE TO REFLECT
ON THE CONCEPT OF "DUE PROCESS"

If the actual Gitmo detainees had arrived there via a rigorous process of investigation and lawful detention, they would still be entitled to due process. This is what we as Americans pretend to believe in. But the reality is that overwhelmingly those people wound up in this inescapable black hole through a diabolical combination of bad luck and military and law-enforcement dishonesty and ineptitude -- dishonesty and ineptitude that have also made it virtually impossible to try even the legitimately implicated defendants in anything resembling an actual legal procedure. It's almost funny. In the cases of the minuscule percentage of the detainees who are actually still suspected of committing some sort of crimes, the record of abusive detention minimizes the possibility of actually pressing legal cases in court.

The fact is, however, that most of the detainees should never have been detained, and even in the case of those for whom there may once have been some reason for further scrutiny, the grounds for suspicion have mostly fallen apart. But because of the government's need to cover all those exposed butts, hardly any of the detainees have much hope of release anytime soon. And this is also almost funny: How many of the detainees who had no connection to terrorism before they were shanghaied into the system can be expected, if they're finally released, to head for their nearest terrorist recruiting office?

Of course the career butt-coverers have powerful allies among right-wing pols who are either (once again) too stupid or too dishonest to acknowledge the monumental, probably irrecoverable botch we have made of this whole situation. And for a public that has embraced thuggery and imbecility as virtues, the magic words "national security" cover all sins.

IF YOU'RE CURIOUS WHAT EXACTLY THE
GOV'T TRIED TO GET AWAY WITH THIS TIME . . .

Here's Michael Doyle's explanation:

The Obama administration has sought to impose a new requirement that detainees' attorneys sign a "memorandum of understanding" in order to meet with their clients. Six detainees challenged the new requirement, which covers those who no longer have an active or pending habeas petition.

The MOU, Lamberth noted, strips counsel of their “need to know” designations, and explicitly denies counsel access to all classified documents or information which counsel had “previously obtained or created” in pursuit of a detainee’s habeas petition. Counsel can obtain access to their own classified work product only if they can justify their need for such information.

"At its heart," Lamberth wrote, "this case is about whether the Executive or the Court is charged with protecting habeas petitioners’ right to access their counsel."

Well, yes, that's the legal heart of the case. But Judge Lamberth himself made it clear that the real heart of the matter is larger. Let's look again at what he wrote:

It is a sad reality that in the ten years since the first detainees were brought to Guantanamo Bay not a single one has been fully tried or convicted of any crime. Despite this, the Government has fought to deny detainees the ability to challenge their indefinite detentions through habeas proceedings. In a litany of rulings, this Court and the Supreme Court have affirmed that the Federal courts are open to Guantanamo detainees who wish to prove that their indefinite detentions are illegal.

There oughtta be a law!

Right-wing demagogues like to pretend that Gitmo detainees are there for a reason, and are being treated with more consideration than is called for even by such quaint principles as the Geneva conventions, and in any case terrorism can only be dealt with by "national security" procedures that override the mere tenets of law enforcement. Once again this right-wing demagogues are either too stupid or too dishonest to know or acknowledge that the most effective rooting out of terrorists has been accomplished by competent and vigorous law enforcement.

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Can we trust the military to police sexual harassment of any kind, let alone the anti-LGB kind?

The U.S. military's historically pervasive straight-horny-boys-will-be-horny-boys attitude doesn't bode well for its commitment to protecting non-straight servicefolk from discrimination and harassment.

by Ken

JD Smith, co-director of OutServeUS, "the underground network of LGBT actively serving military personnel," has been keeping tabs on orders issued by our various armed forces for implementation of training for the post-DADT era in the military. You can keep track of his tweets here, most recently from Friday:

Received confirmation that the AF has started to distribute at least tier 1 #DADT training. We have @outserveus members that have taken.

Since nobody understands less about tweeting than I do, or gleans less information from them, here are some links I extracted from JD's tweets:

* Marine Commander PowerPoint on "Repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT)" [2/16]

* "Navy Timeline on Training" [2/8], TwitPics of "marine/navy commander training" [2/10], and a TwitPic of "More training" from the Navy [2/11]

This is all highly encouraging. We're often assured by military types that the military is punctilious about following the law, and can be trusted to adapt to enforce changes in law pertaining to it.

I'm not the only one who has limits to my trust, however. We're still not seeing how the military plans to cope with resistance through the ranks to the elimination of discrimination based on sexual orientation, a mindset that after all is ingrained in the minds of an awful lot of military personnel -- including, for example, many of the chaplains on whose behalf loud and persistent objections to DADT repeal were raised, claiming that these folks were going to be coerced to violate their religious beliefs, as indeed I guess they will be if their religious beliefs are homophobic, as apparently many of theirs are. (We hear a lot of horror stories about the extremely right-wing impact on military personnel of the heavily right-wing evangelical contingent among the chaplains.)

Part of my inherent distrust of the military's will to eliminate discrimination based on sexual orientation is the military's generally dismal record on dealing with matters of sexual conduct altogether.

Society at large, we know, deals very, very badly with sex. Given the basic authoritarian impulse of people who crave power to control, it may be that nothing, not even the lust for money (which after all is usually built into that craving for power), is so disruptive to that control as the lust for flesh. We know that it's part of the most basic human organism, but that only makes it more dangerous to the authoritarian mind set, since after all it means that every human under its nominal control is a potential sexual renegade.

Society at large, as I say, has never gotten a grip on this problem of sexuality, especially since the onset of the famous Sexual Revolution, which aimed precisely at loosening that grip. Military society has it even worse, because it has a long history of exploiting sexual aggressiveness. In the standard military mindset, after all, the qualities that make good soldiers often come hand in glove with -- heck, are thought to be the very same qualities as -- those that produce abusive sexual behavior. As long as it could, the military got by with the old "boys will be boys" attitude.

But then, the straight white male arbiters of social orthodoxy have always had a soft spot for straight white male sexual predation. In the orthodox view, after all, why did God create women except to serve as (a) men's household servants and (b) outlets for men's sexual urges? Isn't it in the Bible? (Well, not exactly, but the straight white male social autocrats manage to find biblical authority for every bit of repressive behavior they like.)

We have a general idea of how hard it has been for the military "good old boys" to deal with the increasing presence of women in their midst, and my guess is that even now an awful lot of U.S. military women would argue that the military still hasn't dealt with their presence, in terms of imagining women as something other than sexual playthings for their horny "boys." I can't think of any reason to imagine that the conduct of openly LGB servicemen would be in any way objectionable or deleterious to military discipline, any more than it is now among the many serving LBG military people -- in contrast to the wildly objectionable sexual conduct of all those boys-being-straight-boys.

In this context I'm more than a little alarmed by this latest development in a story I've been following only vaguely. I suppose I should couch this in terms of "claimed"s and "alleged"s, and from a proper legal standpoint those would be totally appropriate. But we're dealing with military justice here, and military justice rarely recognizes the niceties of the regular kind. And in this instance, does anyone really have any doubt as to who's telling the truth and who's trying to cover its dirty military butt?

From the San Diego LGBT Weekly:

EXCLUSIVE: Joseph Rocha refutes news report that “flawed, unsubstantiated” claims led to his DADT discharge

Posted by LGBT Weekly, Saturday, February 19th, 2011

BY JONATHAN YOUNG

The Associated Press has reported, “the Navy says it wrongly accused Navy dog handler Michael Toussaint of singling out a gay sailor for hazing at kennels he ran in Bahrain.” However, that gay sailor, San Diegan Joseph Rocha, says the AP has their facts totally wrong.

Former Petty Officer Third Class Rocha, who was discharged in 2007 under the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, says Toussaint singled him out for being gay, causing him mental trauma and his exit from the Navy. The AP released a story on Thursday, citing two anonymous sources, saying, “Two Naval officers now say that Navy officials have found the investigation into Rocha’s charges was flawed, and the claims unsubstantiated.”

In an interview exclusive to the San Diego LGBT Weekly, Rocha says the AP version is not the Navy’s official view, and even though he has high-ranking Naval officials backing him, the AP will not retract nor correct their story.

“The official story is the United States Navy has come to a conclusion as to how to proceed with the discharge of Senior Chief Toussaint, and what type of discharge he would receive, what rank and what pay he would be entitled to after that discharge,” Rocha said. “First thing yesterday (Thursday) morning, the Under Secretary (Juan Garcia, Assistant Navy Secretary for Manpower and Reserve Affairs) contacted me to let me know the decision.”

Garcia’s decision, obtained by the San Diego LGBT Weekly through Rocha, reads:

“I approved the recommendation of the Retirement Grade Determination Board that MACS Toussaint transfer to the Fleet Reserve in paygrade E-8 with an honorable discharge. In making my determination, I thoroughly reviewed the matter, and weighed heavily material provided in the statements recorded during the initial command investigation and the record of proceedings from the Retirement Grade Determination Board.

“Ultimately, MACS Toussaint’s conduct as the Leading Chief Petty Officer assigned to the Military Working Dog Division, Naval Security Forces, Bahrain, did not meet the standards expected of senior enlisted leadership in our Navy. The Secretary of the Navy concurred with the CNO’s decision that Toussaint not be permitted to re-enlist in the United States Navy. However, when looking at his career in its entirety, I have determined that his conduct did not rise to a level sufficient to warrant retirement in a paygrade less than E-8.”

“The official decision is quite simply that the judgments and actions of Senior Chief Toussaint, while in charge of the canine unit in Bahrain, were not what was expected of senior leadership, and did not fit in with the Navy’s core values,” Rocha summarized, adding, “Which is not anything different than what we were expecting.”

The AP reported an entirely different story.

“They (the AP) went on to write 136 words based on two anonymous sources that were not official and made it read like it was coming from the institution of the Navy,” Rocha said. The two sources were never named, and the story read, “The officers spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a private personnel matter.”

The AP contacted Rocha after the first story was released, seeking to get his reaction for a second expanded story.

“They didn’t bother to tell me that the original story and the following story were going to accuse me of being a fraud,” Rocha said. “So I offered a reasonable and respectful quote that reflected the conversation that I had with the Under Secretary. That quote was then used in the longer piece that was used to attack me.”

The second version of the story spread across the country on Friday, with major publications reprinting the report, including versions in The Washington Post newspaper and Advocate magazine.

After reading the AP stories, Rocha immediately called Garcia to confirm the position of the Navy, “which would have been an underhanded insult, considering the conversation we had earlier,” Rocha said. “He insisted that the AP stories were not the position of the Navy.”

Also during the second conversation, Rocha said Garcia already had attempted to contact the AP to correct the story with the accurate report. Garcia also said he was “unclear” to who the anonymous sources were, according to Rocha.

“Essentially he was telling me over the phone that everything the Navy has produced supports what I am saying,” Rocha continued. “Nowhere will it say they made any wrongful accusations, and nowhere will it say they are retracting or going back on what they said a year ago when they first pulled Chief Toussaint out of active duty. And his memos and official writings were consistent with finding of Toussaint leadership and actions that did not fall in line with core values of the United States Navy.”

Repeated emails from Rocha to the AP writer have gone unanswered. Inquiries to the AP from Garcia’s staff have also been answered, according to Rocha. . . .

Now the Navy actually doesn't come off too bad here. Secretary Garcia's version of the decision, while it still sounds to me like a whitewash relative to the Navy's own reckoning of the facts, at least the Navy seems to have made some reckoning of those facts, but this is in a situation that had already become embarrassingly public, and the overall judgement doesn't seem to me to bode well for the kinds of situations that are bound to arise after DADT passes from the military code.

Which still leaves the whole question of where the AP's wildly divergent story came from, and how it became, effectively, the version of public record.

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